After the safari
photo essay appeared in the winter issue of CEO Traveler, readers wrote to say
how much they enjoyed the pictures and that they would like to know more about
the trip. Im answering these requests with an article about my experience.

The big game hunt was on. The land cruiser bounced slowly over
the terrain. Six passengers, led by a driver-guide, had come a long
way to see and to shoot strong sleek animals. They carried binoculars
and cameras and peered through the vehicles roof, which was
open for better viewing. A flood of memories from countless wildlife
films and old photographs poured forthlions nonchalantly viewing
intruders in the game parks, the sighting of a dangerous Cape buffalo
straining across a moat or a delicate timid nyala hiding in the
bush and distinguished gentlemen like Theodore Roosevelt and the
Prince of Wales hunting untamed species on the Dark Continent.

It was our second day
in Kenya and the one on which we launched our safari in earnest. I had
arrived in Nairobi the previous morning and was greeted at the airport
by a courier from African Express, the Kenyan affiliate of the company through
which I booked the tour in the United States. He escorted me to the first of
the Lonrho Hotels in which we would stay while in Kenya, the historic
Norfolk Hotel, where Ernest Hemingway, Winston Churchill and other big
game hunters had also signed the guest register.

Nairobi is a dangerous place in which to walk, particularly on
Sunday when the town is shuttered. But the planned excursion to
two legendary sites compensated for the disappointment of not being
able to get lost on foot in the big city. We visited the Karen
Blixen Museum, which is housed in her former residence. The
release of the movie "Out of Africa," based on her book
about farming a large coffee plantation on the surrounding tract
and her complex relationships with the natives, aroused international
interest in the writer and led to the opening of the museum.

That same afternoon,
along with other tourists and local children, we stopped at the Langata Giraffe
Center to observe the famous Rothschild giraffes. Some of the spotted animals
were as tall as 18 feet. Visitors fed them through a wire fence while standing
on an elevated platform.

In the evening, we
ate at Nairobis most unusual open-air restaurant, the incomparable Carnivore,
featuring grilled gamezebra, ostrich, hartebeest, crocodile, wildebeest
and elan. Combination plates are offered so that diners can sample several of
these delicious meats.

Following breakfast
at the Norfolk, we loaded up the vehicle and set out for the Aberdare Mountains,
reaching the Aberdare Country Club in time for lunch. Throughout Kenya,
the roads are paved for long stretches, but then they become pothole-filled
dirt. In addition to speaking English well and knowing everything about the
animals, plants and history of the area, our driver-guide was as skilled as
an Olympic slalom skier in "schussing" around potholes.

We spent the night at The Ark,
a large wooden building on piles with upswept bows and so named
because of its resemblance to the ark where Noah took refuge. It
overlooks a floodlit glade with a salt lick and waterhole. From
the open deck above and the expansive windows on the lower floor,
we observed families of elephants shielding their young, nervous
gazelles keeping an eye open for predators while always poised to
flee into the bush should a lion appear and herds of water buffalo
led by males who fought over dominance.

Since the temperature
drops after dark due to the 7,500-foot elevation, hot water bottles are tucked
into the beds. When an especially interesting species arrives, in our case it
was a panther, guests wrap themselves in their blankets and rush to the deck
to try to catch the sight.

We then traveled to
the posh Mt. Kenya Safari Club, 7,000 feet above sea level on the lower
slopes of Mt. Kenya. Although it is located at the equator, a log fire
burned each evening in the elegant private cabins.

An animal orphanage
on the grounds features a veritable zoo of abandoned animals, including three
young cheetahs, monkeys, ostriches, bongos (their skin is used to make bongo
drums) and a 130-year old turtle on whose back you can ride.

The following morning
we descended 3,000 feet to enter Samburu National Park. This is a land
of semi-desert with relief coming from the winding Uaso Nyiro River,
its green banks rimmed with palms and providing refuge for some rare species
like gerenuks and dik diks.

Our next lodging, Sweetwaters Tented
Camp, at the nearby Sweetwaters
Game Reserve was modeled after camps of yesteryear, but was
comfortably appointed with concrete floors, electricity and en
suite bathrooms. Each large tent faces a shallow moat with an
electric fence that separated us from an illuminated waterhole where
giraffes, elephants, waterbucks and oryx play out nightly dramas
of survival. Other resident game include Grants gazelles,
Thompson gazelles, cheetahs, jackals, ostriches and baboons.

During an afternoon
drive, we had our picture taken with a domesticated black rhino, Morani, who
has lived on the ranch and was raised by humans since his mother was killed
in 1974. Because Sweetwaters is a private property, we were able to take a nocturnal
game drive to see species that make themselves scarce during daylightleopards,
silverbacked hyenas, aardvarks and porcupines. Drives in darkness are especially
exciting as an animals glowing eyes can often be seen before determining
its shape and the pattern of the fur.

The Jane Goodall
Chimpanzee Sanctuary is on the grounds and can only be reached by boat.
The 27 resident chimpseach has a namelike to show off and amuse
visitors by running along the riverbank.

Our last exposure to a game park in Kenya was the important Masai
Mara National Reserve, reached by a short flight from Nanyuki
airport and abutting to the south, the great Serengeti of Tanzania.
We bedded at the exclusive Mara Safari
Club in luxurious tents with verandahs from which we could
look down on the Mara River where approximately 15 hippos lolled
in the brown water, surfacing with their noses and making loud snorts
every few minutes.

During the stay at the
club, our driver-naturalist took us into the savanna plain, off the reserve
roads to seek out the hiding places of lions, jackals and rare birds. He knew
where to locate every animal and plant variety and had a tale to tell about
each one.

Masai Mara is also the
land of the Masai, the natives about whom Karen Blixen wrote. An ancient people,
famous as fierce warriors, the government granted them permission to continue
their traditional ways of grazing cattle on the reserve. We were permitted to
visit a village for a fee and went inside one familys small dung and clay
thatched-roofhut. Since the Masai will only allow their photographs
to be taken for money, the village is the best place to snap pictures of them
in their tribal dressbright red blanketsand of the men bearing steel-tipped
spears.

After a flight to Nairobi where we remained overnight, we were
driven to Tanzania and met at the border by a representative from
Bushbuck Safaris, organizer of the second part of the trip. Traveling
over a bumpy dirt roadall of the countrys roads are
poorwe reached Lake Manyara National
Park and checked into the Lake
Manyara Serena Lodge. Built by the Aga Khan in the mid-1990s,
it is one of three of the outstanding chains hotels in which
we stayed.

The main attraction
of the beautiful area surrounding Lake Manyara is the large population of birds
of many species. After observing the habits and the flight patterns of the colorful
feathered creatures, we were on our way to the Serengeti National Park,
where, while staying at another stellar property, Serengeti Serena Lodge,
we spent two days roaming the Serengeti Plain. The greatest concentration of
plains animals in Africa rove on this tract, home to an estimated two million
wildebeests, half a million Thompsons gazelles and a quarter of a million
zebras, all being hunted by lions, leopards, cheetahs and hyenas.

Many of the game reserves in Kenya are enclosed with electric fences
to keep the animals in and the poachers out. In Tanzania there are
no barriers; the animals can move about freely and migrate at will.

On game drives we met
other tourists in land cruisers wandering the area. Driver-guides used their
wireless telephones to communicate with each other about specific sightings
of animals. In one instance, we joined four other vehicles surrounding a group
of ten lions lying in the morning sun and sleeping off their successful night
hunting expeditions. They paid us no heed; one female raised her head, looked
at us briefly and went back to sleep near her cubs.

The most spectacular
happening at the Serengeti was the annual migration toward Masai Mara of herds
of wildebeests joined by zebras. On the day after our arrival, there were thousands
of animals suddenly pouring northward in large determined throngs. The wildebeest
looks somewhat like our American buffalo, but it is smaller and its migration
pattern is reminiscent of that of the buffalo in our Old West.

When some of the wildebeests
stopped to drink at a watering hole, a crocodile slyly grabbed a young wildebeest
and pulled it under the water while the herd, except for the mother, fled in
panic. For a long time she stood on the shore looking forlornly for her baby.

Our next excursion was
to the Olduvai Gorge, site of the archeological excavations where Mary
Leakey discovered the oldest human remains.

After a drive on a
climbing road, we reached the stunning Ngorongoro Serena Lodge overlooking
the 102-square-mile Ngorongoro Crater, which is home to so many animals
that it has been compared to Noahs ark or the Garden of Eden. From the
rim we drove down into the flat plain at the bottom of the extinct volcano to
view beautiful flocks of pink flamingoes descending on Lake Magdi in
the middle of the crater, as well as every other species of animal, which we
had come upon before.

My two thrilling weeks
in Africa ended with a long ride back to Nairobi to catch the flight home. During
the time I spent in Kenya and Tanzania, I met visitors from many parts of the
world, all of whom were enthusiastic about having vacationed in East Africa.
Many of them offered that the safari was one of their most treasured travel
adventures. I, too, was satisfied. In hindsight I might have opted to spend
just one rather than two weeks animal watching. But the choice would have been
difficult. Kenya and Tanzania are both remarkable places.